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Review: In ‘Our Blood Is Wine,’ Raising Glasses to Tradition in an Ex-Soviet State

The sommelier Jeremy Quinn in the documentary “Our Blood Is Wine,” directed by Emily Railsback.Credit...Music Box Films
Our Blood Is Wine
Directed by Emily Railsback
Documentary
Not Rated
1h 18m

If, like me, you’ve been imbibing rather more than usual this last year, then you won’t need much persuading to watch “Our Blood Is Wine,” a slightly tipsy, thoroughly charming documentary about winemaking in post-Soviet Georgia. By the end, so many glasses have been raised in lip-smacking appreciation that the movie’s most impressive accomplishment is not its deep dive into grape-centered lore, but the ability of its director, Emily Railsback, to hold her iPhone camera steady.

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Some of the handmade clay pots seen in “Our Blood Is Wine” that are key to winemaking in Georgia.Credit...Music Box Films

Eagerly accompanied by the sommelier Jeremy Quinn, Ms. Railsback scours the country to discover a reinvigorated culture of independent vintners and ancient traditions. The homogenized factory wine produced under the Soviets — pronounced “garbage” by one Georgian and necessitating the destruction of hundreds of varieties of grapes — is a stain that these dedicated craftsmen are eager to erase. Employing an underground fermenting method many thousands of years old, they bury the grape slurry in handmade clay pots. Nine months later, a delicious drink is born, its initial tasting typically described as a sacred experience. An ecstatic Mr. Quinn concurs.

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A preview of the film.

Between sips, various experts — an archaeologist here, an ethnographer there — are consulted, their sober contributions grounding the wine in Georgia’s turbulent history. And though the movie’s loose, sampling style can leave regions and varieties poorly differentiated, its real stars are the vintners. Young or old, entrepreneur or family-only producer, all are passionate and poetic about their beloved beverage. After hearing one claim his thriving vines were owed not to fertilizer, but to soil soaked in the blood of centuries of invaders, you might never understand the term “full-bodied” in quite the same way again.

Not rated. In English and Georgian, with English subtitles. Running time: 1 hour 18 minutes.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section C, Page 6 of the New York edition with the headline: Our Blood Is Wine. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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